Zimmerman Not guilty

by mouthy 480 Replies latest social current

• 

  Simon

  "Can you please name me any law that says black people do not have a right that white or hispanic people do?"

  Please? Anyone? Still waiting ... are there any? I'm not really surprised at the silence because I think we all know the answer.

  Race crimes are not civil rights issues but could easily be confused by people who don't understand the issues. They are criminal issues and human rights issues. The Civil Rights movement happened, the right side won. It's now being evoked as something that it wasn't and I believe that undermines it and diminishes it.

  If a race drime has been committed then it is just that - a crime which should be investigated and if necessary prosecuted.

  All this talk of Civil Rights over this is simply taking advantage of the past.

  If people are hurting others whether they are black or white (and we can dig up plenty of examples of either so I don't think that is beneficial other than to escalate emotions) then that is criminal and violating their human rights.

  Civil Rights are when someone passes a law or puts up a sign saying "your kind are not welcome here" or "you don't qualify for something others get because of who you are". Is that happening anywhere in 2013 other than toward gay and lesbians?
• 

  lisaBObeesa

  Civil rights = the same rights for all in society with everyone equal in the eyes of the law.

  Can you please name me any law that says black people do not have a right that white or hispanic people do?

  As you know, those laws have been outlawed in this country fairly recently, within the lifetime of many here on this board. We have at least come that far.

  The fact that no laws come out an say people of color's civil rights can be violated does not mean people of color's civil rights are no longer violated.

  Take for example New York's 'Stop and Frisk'.

  Almost 90% of people 'stopped and frisked' are completely innocent. The police must be really, really bad at knowing what 'suspicious' behavior is, or they are stopping people for something other than suspicious behavior.

  "For example, in 2011, Black and Latino New Yorkers made up 24 percent of the population in Park Slope, but 79 percent of stops." http://www.nyclu.org/issues/racial-justice/stop-and-frisk-practices

  the people of color in Park Slope are not being treated equally by law enforcement, and thus, their civil rights are being violated. Remember, most of the people stopped are completely innocent. And most are people of color.

  http://ccrjustice.org/floyd

  This is just one example. There is much work still to be done in this country.
• 

  Simon

  lisaBObeesa: I think you may be confusing Civil Rights with Civil Liberties. I can understand the confussion because they are very similar and it's easy to do. This may help:

  http://civilrights.findlaw.com/civil-rights-overview/civil-rights-vs-civil-liberties.html
• 

  lisaBObeesa

  lisaBObeesa: I think you may be confusing Civil Rights with Civil Liberties. I can understand the confussion because they are very similar and it's easy to do

  .

  No, I am not confused. The charges against "Stop and Frisk" are that, as practiced by the NYPD, it violates people's civil rights.

  http://ccrjustice.org/floyd

  The NYPD’s stop-and-frisk practices are illegal. Racial profiling and searches based on illegal profiling violate the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition against unreasonable searches.

  As I said, this is just one easy to think of example of the actual fight for civil rights going on in this country today. There is still much work to do in this country. Pretending there is not a problem is part of the problem. So, please stop it.
• 

  MeanMrMustard

  @awaken2004:

  You are confusing. Simon has been consistent throughout all the recent Zimmerman/TrayVon threads. He hasn't been racist at all. Nor an ass.

  MMM
• 

  Simon

  lisa: I guess the terms are often used interchangeably in common speech but the accuracy and specific meaning isn't worth arguing about.

  The point I was trying to make was that the Civil Rights movement was about getting the rights that other races had that non-whites (not just blacks) didn't.

  That fight was won as everyone now has equal rights under the law so claiming the GZ trial is the biggest Civil Rights issue of the century (Crump) is disingenuous and solely used for political gain / self promotion as well as not being fair or giving the respect deserved to those who faught it.
• 

  lisaBObeesa

  That fight was won as everyone now has equal rights under the law

  I have already shown one example where everyone does NOT have equal rights under the law.
• 

  James Brown

  When you are a cop you don't racial profile anybody or you wont make it out of basic training.

  • You have to be able to put into words why you stop someone.
  • No one will ever be racialy profiled.
  • Every one will be stoped because there is a legaly verbily documetable reason.

  Or the cop wont be on the force long.

  I was a cop at the end of every shift your sgt reviews all of your reports and at the end of every week the lieutenant reviews all of the sgts. reports and at the end of every month the captain reviews the lietenants reports and up the line to the major, then the sheriff or Police Chief.

  Systems can be abused and people can not do their duty. But they stand to loose their job when investigated and they are investigated and accredited all the time. We were accredited every 6 months by an independent agency.
• 

  James Brown

  Successful drunks and criminals know to keep their vehicles in working order.

  Because cops stop them for lights out, missing, illegible plates, safety violations.

  They don't stop them because of their color.
• 

  soft+gentle

  whilst I thoroughly appreciate this site, Simon, I appreciate posters' opinions and committments to various beliefs even more because I think they stem from people' real life experiences and their ethical responses to them and this would include experiences of frequent racism. So if we choose to focus on racial aspects of the Zimmerman case and if we want to protest about this we would like to feel that our committments to wanting change are respected, as another poster on this thread has also said.

  You insisting that we must stick to "facts" and "law" sounds quite legalistic to me and is worth challenging because we do not live in a legalistic world. Protest (non violent that is) does garner the ear of politicians and on the other hand politicians in order to legitimate policy need to be able to say they are listening to the people. Regarding the media (and bringing sammilees's wife into the discussion too), I would say it is is not just about the media manipulating public perception but that politicans and the public use the media to bring attention to what changes they want to see implemented. Okay yes the media go overboard but still there is a feedback loop that we must not forget.